Pris For Your Pleasure
by Jay Gee Three
Summary: Bladerunner 4; the book of the film of the book. The film is so different from the original novel, this is the novelisation of the film. Nuevo Frisco was down the wrong end of the Boulevard. Pris was a Pleasure model. She was dressed for the job. She was a waif. She could - would - persuade J.F. Sebastian to get Roy into Tyrell's. Who could resist her? She is for your pleasure.


Chapter 8

Nuevo Frisco was down the wrong end of the seven mile long Independence Boulevard. It was a redevelopment from before the last war, straight through the heart of the city. Like an arrow straight to the heart of the city, some people said when it was being cleared. Up at the other end of the Boulevard, over the hill, was the bright centre and the high towers of the newly rebuilt San Francisco. Those brightly lit towers shone over the brim of the hill, with Nuevo Frisco at the other end. Literally, over the hill. Seven miles - and a continent away, so it seemed.

Pricilla, Pris for short, was a Pleasure model. She appeared to be about twenty. She wore a short but shaggy blonde wig, this had a proven affect of making her head appear larger and her face appear smaller. It also made her eyes appear larger within her face. Especially since she wore a very pale foundation. On this occasion, she preferred to stress her eyes. They were made up with thick dark mascara and dark purple eye-shadow, fading subtlely around the edges to a shade of grey plum. If she adopted a certain expression, the accentuated eyes would appeal to a man. She had a very straight nose with soft fine nostrils, a recurring design feature that the genetic-designer known as Jif included as often as the commercial clients would allow him to. On her lips, unusually for this type of model, she wore no lipstick. She found that men associated the use of lipstick with sexual knowledge - she didn't really know why - and she would usually wear it, but for this task she needed a different appearance.

She was dressed for the job. It wasn't a look that needed to be smart. She wore a short, low-cut strappy and sheer black dress with a semi-transparent meshing with high neck and long sleeves worn over it, opaque black stockings held up with blue ribbons that left about four inches of bare flesh between the hem of the dress and the top of the stockings. This always worked, even though stockings are no more than long socks, the associative effect in a man's mind made them something much more than that. The exposed flesh between the dress and stockings always added to the effect. A large bag hung from her shoulder that bounced off her hip as she walked. She wore high-heeled ankle boots and leg-warmers. She had a thick, but short, jacket which helped to create the effect of her legs being thin, emaciated almost, but well shaped.

A waif.

But a desolate and desolating, destroying waif.

There were times when a smart, glossy, streamlined look worked best. But on this occasion this would be the look that would work. It was a look that didn't fail.

All the earlier efforts that the other Replicants had made to infiltrate The Tyrell Corporation had been fruitless because they had believed they only had to get in at any level and they would be able to work from within to hack the information they needed.

Now that they had acquired the vital piece of information from Chew, they knew they needed to get in at the level of the Director-Designer-Genius. And that would have to be through a contact.

Pris could - she would - persuade J.F. Sebastian to get Roy and Leon into Eldon Tyrell's sanctum. Then Roy would be able to find the information they needed. Everything they needed to know about the conundrum that consumed them, was consuming their lives. Morphology. And longevity. About incept dates. And expiry dates. And, especially, about life extensions.

Pricilla had found the apartment building that J.F. Sebastian occupied. The address that Chew had on his lips as he died at Roy's hands. Died, because, although Chew gave up the information they needed, there were to be no prisoners and no witnesses - and because anyone associated with Tyrell was to be punished for, what the Replicants took to be, collective guilt. They weren't, their thinking wasn't very subtle, but that is a traint that isn't confined to Reps, after all.

She had scouted it out the day before, before the night-rains came, and she had learnt that he lived alone. Not only alone, but also as the sole resident of this building, and the entire block. When she had found the building it was the crummiest looking building in the crummiest part of the crummiest district in this busted up city. She had waited to see what time J.F. Sebastian came home so that, now, on the following day, she had sauntered casually along the road, picking her way round the rubbish in the street. She stepped under the stone canopy of the building. Pris looked about, put the Drizapone 'cigarette' to her lips and dragged deeply on it. She threw it out into the road and watched the embers of the stub die down on the wet surface.

Twenty minutes earlier, as she walked through the neighbourhood on foot, she had been approched by a couple of hustlers who had said they had a special job for her. Something to do with cooking, it seemed. Spit-roasting, so they had said. An unfamiliar, Earth-based, expression to her. They had arrived at an assumption of her based on how she was dressed and that she was in that district. Neither of them would have been easy for a human woman to injure, let alone kill. She had left both of them dead in an alleyway. One of them with a crushed skull, the other with a snapped spine. All done easily enough. There weren't cops around in this part of the city. She had lit up the Drizapone 'cigarette' then, after she emerged from the alleyway and had crossed the road. She enjoyed a cigarette after a kill.

She had received an elbow to the face in the brief struggle, but fortunately it was to the left eye socket so the eye make-up would cover it. But now, standing under the canopy waiting for JF Sebastian, and just to be sure, she checked her compact to make sure the bruise wasn't coming up. She dabbed some more eye shadow over her eyes, deepening the existing colour down to a dark damson. She adjusted her dress, her jacket and stockings. She had a hole in one of them now. That was alright. It would add to the 'little lost waif' effect.

She made one adjustment, she quickly unzipped her ankle boots and removed the leg-warmers she wore and stuffed them in her capacious bag. She didn't need them. After zipping the ankle boots back up, she looked at her reflection in the one remaining intact pane of glass in the apartment blocks front door. She turned to the side. She preferred the long line of her lean legs in the high-heels without the leg-warmers. This adjustment made the end effect appear as though a waif would look well-fed by comparison.

Now she leant against the thick decorated stone column that supported the portico, keeping herself concealed by its bulk. Because of the earlier diversion she had arrived later than she expected, it was only a little over five minutes before JF Sebastian had arrived home the night before, so she didn't have long to wait.

She heard the rumbling hum of the odd cube-like utility vehicle that she had seen him driving the night before. She looked out from behind the column and saw him come along the otherwise trafficless street. She sat down next to the door of the apartment building amongst the large drift of garbage that had been wind-blown into a corner. She took an armful of loose papers and packaging and burrowed herself down into it and piled it up around her. She put a box on her head. Only her mascaraed and thickly eye-shadowed eyes showed. Big and wide and bright.

JF Sebastian parked the vehicle in front of the building and got out. He immediately started fishing around in the large bag he had slung over his shoulder. He was too absorbed looking for it to notice her. So she waited until he came parrellel to where she was concealed and suddenly shook the box off her head. She adopted an expression that was both startled and scared and scattered all the papers and packaging off her. She did this in such a way that it ensured he could not miss the semi-transparent dress hiked up high and the sight of her bare thighs. She scrambled to her feet and dropped her bag and ran, stumbling and bumping into the man as she did so and knocking him over. She skidded in her heels on the wet sidewalk and turned her ankle, slamming her shoulder into the side door of his utility van. She cracked the glass. She stopped and rubbed her shoulder, as though she were in pain. She looked back at him with huge eyes.

'Hey!' he called out after her. He was picking himself up off the sidewalk with her bag in his hand. 'Don't forget your bag. I know you women can't go anywhere without them.'

She stepped back gingerly. She adopted the appearance of wariness as she reached out and grabbed her bag back, throwing it over her shoulder. They stood looking at each other for a few moments.

'Don't worry,' he said, 'I won't hurt you. What are you doing tucked up in the garbage there, little lady?' The man spoke in the elongated drawl of the South-Eastern states which Pricilla couldn't quite understand.

'Quoi?' she tried.

'Are you lost?'

'Lust?' she queried.

'Are you lost?' he reprated.

'I'm lost' Pris said. She knew a nervous smile would work well here. She smiled. Nervously.

The man swept his hand through his hair and then pawed around his neck nervously.

'I just needed some shelter. From the night-rain. That's all. The paper keeps you warm, y'know. You won't report me?'

'Report you. Why?'

'Vagrancy. I'm not a vagrant,' Pricilla bit her lip. 'I'm just a bit lost.'

'No, no, no!' he assured her, 'I'm not going to do that. We hardly ever see the police along this end of the Boulevard anyway.'

'I'm just lost,' Pricilla repeated, she looked at him with a mixture of nervousness and anxiety, 'I don't know this part of the city and there's no more public transport back to the city centre after dark. And I missed the last one before I could get back onto Independence Boulevard. I just wanted to keep warm for the night. That's all.'

'What's your name?' he asked.

'Pricilla. People call me Pris, for short.'

'Why? I think Pricilla is a lovely name. Mine's JF Sebastian. I'm normally just called JF.'

'Hi,' she said. Pricilla smiled for a moment.

'Hi,' he said. 'Where were you going? Y'live round here?'

She shrugged, saying nothing. He was just starting to turn to open the door to the apartment building. Now, she thought. Pris stepped up close to him. He would 'feel' her closeness to him. She towered over him and smiled broadly, like old friends do.

'We scared each other pretty good, didn't we?' She giggled and pulled at the hem of her dress appearing to tug at it to straighten it and pull it down, but raising it to reveal the tops of her thighs. He moved his eyes so that he appeared to be looking away, but was drawn to the pale skin.

'We sure did!' he said, reflecting her smile back at her.

Pricilla smiled again and laughed a girlish laugh. She looked down at the ground. This is when the dark eye make-up really works. She looked at him while keeping her head bowed, so that her eyes appeared wide and large below the shaggy fringe.

'Look. If you're stranded in Nuevo Frisco, do you want to come in?' JF asked. 'Its gotta be better than sleeping under garbage.'

'I was hoping you'd say that,' she said, keeping her smile bright and natural. He smiled nervously up at her and turned to open the door.

I'm in, Pricilla thought. The smile disappeared from her lips, replaced by a neutral non-expression, that somehow bordered on the malign. She followed him into the apartment building. He stopped immediately on entering. The entrance hall was flooded with light. It was like daytime. It was raining inside.

'Wait a minute, he said, and he took a torch out of his bag and switched it on.

'There's no light in this place 'til you get up to my floor.'

'There lots of light,' she said. JF pointed upwards. The roof canopy of the foyer had once been glass, an advertising blimp drifted over-head with its high-light beams shining directly downward into the foyer at that moment. There was no glass left in the roof so it was raining just as hard indoors as it was outside.

'It'll be pitch black in a few moments,' JF said, adding, 'Quickly. We might as well use their lights while they're there. This way.' JF started a little jog off to the right. Toward an elevator. Pricilla followed. The express elevator zipped them to the top floor. Only five floors up.

'You live here by yourself?' she asked, knowing the answer.

'Yep. I live pretty much alone right now. Well sort of.'

'Huh?'

'There's no housing shortage round here. Plenty o' room for everybody. If you're looking for a place.'

They exited the elevatior and she followed him as he walked along the corridor to his apartment, fishing in his bag again for the key-card.

'Must get lonely JF.'

'Not really,' he replied. 'I have lots of friends. I make my own.'

'Y'mean, like imaginary friends?'

'Not like that. I'm a genetic designer. D'you know what that is, Pricilla?' He used her name, her full name. He liked that. He opened one of the large wooden double doors to his apartment, at the end of the walkway.

'No,' she answered.

The sound of a tiger growling sounded somewhere in the apartment block. Pris wouldn't know a tiger if she saw one, but she sensed in the sound that there was a threat. She looked apprehensive.

'C'mon in. You'll see what I mean,' JF prattled.

She stepped into his apartment. JF called out, 'Yoo-hoo. Home again,' seemingly to no one. He closed the door behind her and slid several large dead-bolts shut. Pris looked around.

The hallway of his apartment was large and almost entirely bare except for what looked like a feature fountain - that wasn't working - in the centre of the room, with bronze mermaids. In one corner there were forty or fifty, what looked like, old shop mannequins piled up with their faces to the wall and a dust cloth covering about half of them.

Around the high ceiling there was an ornate decoration in a fake baroque style. He noticed her looking around.

'Y'like it?' he asked.

'I've never seen anywhere like this before. I've only lived in small places.'

'They're all like this in this building. They're all large. High ceilings. Ornate. And falling to pieces.' He pointed casually at the mannequins, 'I keep meaning to do something with them but I never get around to it. I've been very busy lately. I like them just like that. I think of them as a crowd that are all very shy, all whispering between themselves.'

There was a pile of what looked like rubbish, but a neatly piled heap of rubbish, by the fountain.

'What's all that?' asked Pricilla.

'What?'

Pricilla pointed at the base of the fountain.

'Y'mean, the books?'

Pricilla narrowed her eyes and looked perplexed, she had never heard the word before. 'What're they for?'

'For reading.'

Pricilla looked blank. She looked down at the pile and read the title on the topmost book 'Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?' She recognised nothing incongruent in the title; she crinckled her brow, how should I know, she thought. JF started to walk forward, but stopped. He put his finger to his lips, indicating "hush", even though she hadn't said anything. 'I hear footsteps,' he said.

A rhythmic beating of boots on floor boards sounded in the next room. Two small automata appeared marching, shoulder-to-shoulder and in-step, through the doorway. One was a stunted misshapen figure with a Pinnochio nose and dressed in a brown uniform in the style of the old European imperial manner and the spiked helmet of the old German army. The other was a large teddy bear in a Napoleonic uniform with sash and medals. They marched together into the hallway and halted with a stamp of the feet.

'Home again. Home again, jiggidy-jig,' they chorused to JF.

'Friends of yours?' she asked.

'Hi there, fellas,' he said to them. He spoke to Pris, 'That's Kaiser Wilhelm' on the left, or just plain Bill, for short. And that is Ready-Eddie Teddy on the right.'

'Hello Bill. Hello Ready-Eddie,' Pricilla said.

'This is Pricilla, say hello to her.'

'Hello friend,' they replied in unison.

'They're my friends. I made them,' JF said.

The automata wheeled about and marched back into the next room. The small disfigured one followed the large teddy, it misjudged his step, and bumped into the door post. It gave a squeaking sound as it did so. JF was looking up at Pris as this happened.

'He does that all the time,' he said, 'I must fix it.'

She smiled. Once she sensed his eyes were no longer on her, the smile dissolved again into the, somehow malign, non-expression.

'They're off to tell my butler to bring me my meal. I'll get them to make you something. Alright?'

Pricilla looked big-eyed again and nodded.

'They can do that?' she asked with an incredulous tone in her voice.

'They're not automata y'know. Anything you can do, they can do. I just make them look that way. Because I can, and I like to make some things like this. It is so different to what I usually work on. These are the friends I make,' JF said. 'Where are your folks then?'

'I'm sort of an orphan,' Pris replied.

'Come through Pricilla,' JF said and he ushered her into a long narrow dining room with a long dining table. He never dined alone. In addition to himself there were places set for Kaiser Willhelm and Ready-Eddie Teddy.

An English butler - with a varnished wooden head - came into the dining-room carrying a tray.

'Good evening, sir,' the butler said.

He set out a range of small bowls, and JF looked up at the butler.

'Good evening. And thank-you, MacCauley,' JF said. 'I have a guest for dinner tonight and would like you to prepare... hold on one moment,' JF turned to Pricilla and half-whispered, 'What would you like to eat?'

'I don't know. What are you eating?'

'Chinese. Go on. Try it.'

She picked at it and tasted it.

'I like it. I'd like some.' She twisted her body to look at MacCauley, bringing one leg up as she said so and resting it on the edge of the seat. JF looked down at the bare flesh and how her dress had ridden up and showed her panties.

'Another one of these please, MacCauley.'

'Very good, sir. I'll instruct Little Suzy to prepare it.' He stepped over to a length of rubber tubing set in the wall with a dull brass cone at one end and spoke quietly into it.

'Little Suzy?' queried Pris.

'Little Suzy Homemaker, she does all my cooking, Priscilla. It was an old food processing automata from before the war. I rennovated it. It's very good,' JF said as Kaiser Willhelm and Ready Teddy came in and sat down. MacCauley set down play-food at their places.

'They can't eat,' he said to Pris. 'Fellas,' he said and leant over conspiratorially at Kaiser Bill and Ready-Eddie Teddy. 'Change to the usual routine. We have a guest for dinner tonight. I'd like you to be on your best behaviour. All right?' He looked over at Priscilla and she laughed.

'Nina!' JF called out.

'Whose Nina?' Pris whispered.

'You'll see.' An automata, styled like a ballerina, pirouetted through the dining-room door. 'She doesn't eat either,' said JF, 'I just like to have her around.'

She danced down the length of the table and back again.

'She's always like this,' he said as an aside to Pricilla. He didn't notice that her expression had slid back to the odd expressionlessness as Pricilla watched the ballerina-automata.

'Sit down, Nina.' JF said. He leaned over to Pricilla. 'She's showing off, that's all.' Then addressed Nina again, 'Take the weight off your points'.'

Chapter 9.

After Rachel had left Deckard continued to shuffle through the photos she had left. He also had another couple of scotchs. He decided to abandon his attempt to drain the rest of the bottle. He stepped over to his electric mini-grand. He sat down and picked out a few simple sequential chords.

Across the top of the mini-grand were family photographs going back a century and more. There were old sepia photos, others were badly focused colour photos taken on ancient Instamatics, others still were foggy and badly pixelated pics from primitive digital cameras from years before, others were high-def prints, and others had three second repeating full-dimensional loops of parties and days at the beach. The photos were of great-great-great grand-parents, showing his anticedents when they were young and then when they were very old, and many ages inbetween. There was another, much more recent picture, of himself sat on the steps of a wooden porch of an old suburban house. From what you could see of it, the porch was just like the porch in the photos that Leon and Rachael had. But a lot of the houses in the old suburbs looked so much alike. He didn't notice how much his mother in the picture looked so much like Leon's and Rachel's. It was a blurry photo anyway but it seemed that he may have had a bit of a blind spot to being able to see that anyway.

The scotch was making him sleepy, and he was tired already. There was something I was supposed to do before I went to bed, he realised. His thoughts were becoming scotch-befuddled. The image of Roy, that he had retrieved from the pile of photographs Rachael had left behind, was stood on the music-stand. He took another sip of scotch. There was something about Rachel. Something that reminded him, so very dimly, of someone. In the next moment Rachel was stood in the centre of his living room. Alongside her stood a unicor...

He awoke.

He had slept, and instantly dreamt again.

He picked the photo of Roy Byron off the music stand, he stood up and tried to shake some of the tiredness out of himself. He took one step back, he was a little unsteady as he walked across his living room. Lets get this done, at least, before I go to bed. He stepped over and pushed the photo into the scanner. The photo came up on the screen with a blue grid overlaid on it. Deckard slumped down in the big comfortable chair in front of the screen. He gave a series of voice commands, the image zoomed in and out and around the image with each command. There was a narrow room behind the bedroom the Replicant sat in. On the wall in that room was a convex mirror with a reflection showing. He gave voice commands to zoom in on that. As he zoomed about the image, he could see, in the hi-res image, a woman lying on a couch-bed in the smaller room, caught in the reflection in the convex mirror. She had a black kimono decorated with white stylised jasmine blossoms lying over her. She was asleep, or had her eyes closed. She had a mark, a tattoo showing on the side of her face and neck, part concealed by her hair line. It was either a dragon or a snake. He recognised her from the template he had seen in Bryant's office. From the screen-shot. It was her. The kick-kill Replicant idented as Zhora.

Deckard gave the voice command for a hard-copy print-out from this pic. He looked closely at the print, then turned his attention back to the image as it appeared on the screen. There was something draped over a room screen. It looked like it was made of grey or silver sequins. Or scales. It occurred to him that the scale he had picked out of Leon Polokov's shower stall might be connected to this. Whatever it was that was draped over the screen, it was clearly too large to be a fish. Like an eel in length, or longer. Except eels don't have scales. It could be a snake. Maybe a dragon. You never quite know what people will get made-to-order. But what would a Replicant, recently arrived on Earth, need such a creature for? he thought. He reached into his jacket pocket and took out the small evidence bag and looked at the scale.

As he sat in the deep comfort of the chair Deckard couldn't be bothered to go to bed. As he was drifting off to sleep, he was thinking over the case he had. And Tyrell. Deckard couldn't figure him. Deckard wondered if was being drawn into a large game of bluff. But, if that was so - to what end?

What did he have to go on? A pile of photo's left behind by the female Replicant, who had, for no apparent reason turned up unannounced and uninvited. Perhaps to deliberately leave this pile of photos? It was a duplicate of Leon's set. Except it had this image of Roy. And it turned out that it also had a picture of Zhora, at an 'unknown' address. And as they appear now, not as they appeared in their 'template' shots.

When you have so little to go on, you have to use what you have. Got to find why this picture is amongst all the others that Rachael had. Got to find the maker of the scale. Then find the maker. Then find the buyer. It might lead somewhere, it might not. I'll start by going to...

Deckard slept. A restful and dreamless sleep, at last.

Chapter 10.

Morning scarcely dawned. The night skies lightened from night black to a deep gloom. The night rains did not abate.

Deckard made his way to the Livestock Market to follow the very slender lead of the scale found at Leon's old place. The Livestock Market was adjacent to Korea Town, down by the waterfront. Any kind of creature, real or synthetic, was available. The real animals attracted astonishing prices but a synthetic one could be had at quite a reasonable price.

A lot of people held that pets were just 'shit-machines'. You fed, scarce, food in at one end. They did nothing at all for you. Then, a day later, you got shit out the other. Before repeating the process over and over again. That is all they did. For the people who held to this view, synthetic animals held the advantage over the real, in that they weren't nearly as expensive and they didn't produce shit. For such people, though, the advantages of a pet were of no interest to them. Warmth? Companionship? Comfort? These things counted for nothing to these sorts of people.

Deckard was one of those people. And who would want a snake for warmth or comfort anyway he thought, as he made his way to one of the Authenticators. She was an old Korean woman. A lot of the refugees were old now. Most, although they had survived, had been sterilised by being exposed to too much radiation for too long. If they hadn't had children when the last war broke out, or their children had not survived the war, they often bought a pet to keep them company. To have a heartbeat in their homes other than their own.

'Fish?' he asked simply, holding the small evidence bag, cocking an eyebrow at her. Sometimes it was easier to talk with facial expressions than it was with spoken language.

She took the scale out of the bag and pushed it under a high-power microscope that automatically searched the surface for any possible microscopic bar-codes that had to be on every scale, (in this case) or strand of fur, or plume, or feather.

An animal from the Livestock Market had to be authenticated. A retailer, or craftsman, couldn't sell it without a certificate. The law was aimed mainly at farm animal sales. A milk cow that can't produce milk, or reproduce, is outright fraud. But for the sake of uniformity it was applied to all animal sales. Especially when there were kitten farms and ostrich farms, and farms for all sorts of real animals, to be kept as pets. With such a huge price differential, buyers wanted the reassurance of a certificate of authentication.

The animals didn't need to be as 'realistic' as the human Replicants. In fact, the Replicants didn't need to be so realistic, either. But they were anyway. The human Replicants did have identifiers, on organ and muscle tissue and bone, but you needed to get them into a body-scanner to read it. The dermis was self-renewing so any identifiers on skin-cells were soon obliterated.

'I'd like to see,' Deckard said and leant over the counter. The old woman turned the screen so he could see it more easily. They both watched the screen as the microscope scanned the sample.

'There is much surface detail,' she said, 'Fine work. I will take it up to a higher resolution.' It turned out that this woman had excellent English, with only a little of her original accent remaining. 'There it is,' she said, 'the makers serial number. 99-0-69-47-XB71. Let me check that. She cut-and-pasted the serial number into a box on another screen. 'Ah,' she said, 'not fish. Snake. Made by Abdul Ben Hassan. It is his ident. He holds a Licence for Artificiers. It is Number XB-71.'

'And where is he?'

'You need to go along to the Fish and Feather Alley. Fifth aisle. Unit 14.'

Deckard looked about the slow moving, shoving throng. 'Which way?' he asked.

'Go left from here,' she replied, 'On the left. Midway down. Easy to find.'

Even allowing for the bad smells that drifted on the air in San Francisco, the Livestock Market was an assault. Practically any large beast that could be traded was here. So, all the smells that animals produce were here to enjoy. He didn't usually come down to this market. This is why they're called 'shit-machines', Deckard thought. He picked his way carefully along the walkway, since quite a few of the animals had been herded along here. He walked through the throng toward the fifth aisle as directed and glanced at a very cute looking - if smelly - miniature horse on the corner by the entrance to the aisle. He tickled it under the chin and it neighed at him. He turned into the alleyway and immediately stood aside as a couple of wranglers herded a small group of ostriches round the corner out of the aisle.

Abdul Hassan was easy to find. Midway down on the left, as he'd been told. Abdul Hassan stood at the doorway in a light coloured jacket and balancing, rather than wearing, a fez upon his large head. He had a long snake of some type around his neck, like he was wearing a scarf. It was a stall filled with glass boxes and tanks with any sliding, slithering creature that seemed to have ever existed. With a few others too, produced from someone's over-active imagination. He gestured to prospective buyers as they walked along. But most people were walking past, looking for something furrier. Something cuter. Deckard made to step into his stall, and Abdul Hassan stood aside to let him in. He stepped behind his counter, gesturing around at the creatures in their tanks.

'What is it that you would like?'

'I'd like some answers. I'm a police officer. You hold the Licence for Artificiers XB-71?'

'That is correct. What is it you want?'

'I have a snake scale from one of your products. Found on the premises of a suspect. I need information.'

'If it wasn't bought second-hand,' Abdul Hassen said defensively. 'None of my stock are poisoness.'

'That's alright Mr Hassan,' Deckard assured him, 'I have a suspect who may have one of your snakes. I need all the information that you have.'

'There are not many people that can afford my work.'

'They can't be that expensive,' Deckard observed. 'Real ones are the ones that cost.'

'Let me see it, please.'

Deckard handed him the snake scale. Hassan put it into his scanner.

'Ah yes, this is one of my finest quality...'

'Forget the sales pitch, pal,' Deckard was curt. 'Who would've bought it.'

'Very few could possibly afford this.'

'How few?'

'Very few. Rare quality.'

'You said.'

Deckard suddenly reached across and grabbed Hassan's tie and he knocked his fez off his head, 'Who bought this one?'

Abdul Ben Hassan, still being held by the neck-tie, looked at the screen again and memorised the serial number. He muttered it over and over to himself as he checked his register of sales.

'Ah. Yes. This one was bought by Taffy Lewis. Down in the Forth Sector, ChinaTown. He gave an address. 11 - 40 Olmec Avenue.'

Deckard let go of his tie and said, 'Thank you for your compliance,' and stepped out of the stall.

A rattlesnake was coiled in one of the glass tanks along the front of Hassan's stall. Deckard tapped the front of the glass as he passed and the snake struck out at the glass with its fangs.

Taffy Lewis, eh? Or Tacky Lewis, as he was known in police circles. Deckard didn't know the man, never had to deal with him, or bust him. But he was a man that kept Vice busy enough.

Before Deckard walked over to the Forth Sector he checked in with Bryant, to see if he had been able to make contact again with Doctor Tyrell. Bryant told him that he had been advised that Rachel hadn't returned to Tyrell's the previous night.

I only met her yesterday, Deckard thought to himself as he terminated the call, and now I find that I'm concerned about her. Where she might be. Why she didn't return to Tyrell.

Chapter 11

The Forth Sector _was_ ChinaTown, a leftover section of the old city, full of narrow streets, lanes and alleyways. It was neon drenched, night and day. It contained the Encounter Bars that were such a thriving business. For men or women. Desire, Lip2Lip, Freedom, Mano Y Mano, Exotica, Cage Aux Folie, Man Trap, Femme Fatale, Rendezvous, Goldigger, The Grail, The Third Degree, Sin of Pride, The House of Fun, Blond On Blond, Venus Dolls, The Immaculate Deception, Menagerie, Torture Palace, Dominator, Grime, Rest'n'Recreation, Bathtime with Johnny, and Bathtime with Janey. One after another along the main drag. Some people actually lived here in this district, though it was mainly the people who worked in the bars and clubs.

Olmec Avenue - the name was a throw back to the old days when this was a Mexican part of town. Deckard found number 11 Olmec, the premises contained one of the Encounter Bars, Exotica, on the ground floor. A low tower block had been built behind it, in the old yard area from back in the days when this entire area had been family houses. Much has changed, Deckard thought dryly.

He walked down the alley to the apartments behind, stepped into the foyer and checked the residents list. Taffy Lewis was listed as living in the penthouse. He rang the buzzer. After a few moments a woman's face came on the entrance security screen. She looked young yet there were bags under her eyes, her hair was a mess and she was dishevelled. She had a black-eye that she was trying to hide with her hand.

'Yeah?'

'Taffy Lewis.'

'And you are?'

'An old friend. Just got into town,' Deckard thought a big smile might help, so he smiled, 'Where is my man?'

'He's working?'

'Working?'

'That's right.'

'I haven't seen him for a while. Where's he working nowadays?'

'Downstairs. At Exotica. You just walked past it.'

'Oh yeah, that's right.'

'Don't mention it.'

'Thanks,' he said.

'No, really. Don't mention I told you,' she said. She cut the connection from her side and the screen went back to the spinning interweaving multicoloured strands of colour.

Deckard walked back down the alleyway and onto Olmec again. Above the door of Exotica there were two women in fluffy fake-fur bikini's dancing within a large Perspex bubble. The fur was pure white so Deckard assumed it was baby-seal fake-fur. They were each wearing ice-hockey goalie masks with Geisha-style make-up painted on them. To add to the bizarre effect they had pig's snouts added. Is that dancing? thought Deckard, I think that's what they're doing. Though it involved a lot of embracing each other and stroking their skin and rubbing their snout's together.

He walked in. Encounter Bars were all things to all people in the modern world. Bar, cafe, restaurant, dance club, meeting place, strip-joint, mott, sex-club, bawdy house, brothel. Something for practically everyone. Even for a chuchman - there were always souls to save, from fun. Or if saving souls wasn't possible, then there were lots of souls to pester.

It was mid-afternoon, and moderately busy. The early-shift workers were winding down before they went home, then the day-workers came in to populate the Bar. At this time of the day there were about two women for every man in the place. Most of them were hostesses. Practically everyone was smoking Drizapone, in long-stemmed clay pipes. Deckard walked over to the bar and asked a barman where Taffy Lewis was.

'Don't tell me. I'll walk along the bar, you give a nod when I get to him. Then you can say you didn't say anything.'

Deckard walked along the bar keeping an eye on the bartender. At the far end of the bar, he was stood behind a fat man near the door. He got the nod. Deckard continued walking past Lewis, looking him over as he did so. The man was large, running to corpulence. His hair was raven black but that colour was obviously out of a bottle of dye. He wore large, thick silver and platinum rings on each of his fingers, like a rich man's knuckle-dusters. So that's Taffy Lewis, thought Deckard.

He turned and approached him from over Lewis's left shoulder.

'Taffy Lewis?' Deckard said, watching him in the mirrors set behind the bar. He dug into his inside jacket pocket for his department I.D. and the hard-copy he'd taken of Zhora. 'I've a few questions for you. You ever buy snakes from the Egyptian?'

'All the time. Where'd you think these came from?' Lewis lifted one of his feet, to show the snakeskin boots.

'I'm talking about one of the living replicas from the Livestock Market.'

'Never go there.'

'I think you do.' Now Deckard showed the grainy printout of Zhora, 'Know this girl?'

'Never seen her. Now buzz-off!'

'Is your licence in order? Pal.' Deckard spat the words directly into Lewis's face.

'How much will it take?' Lewis asked.

Deckard leaned into him, pressing him against the bar, he grabbed his lapels and ground a steel-tipped heel, hard, down onto a snake-skin booted foot. 'I'm not on the take. Pal. Comprendi?'

'So what do you want?'

'Cooperation.'

'I can do that.' Deckard let go of his lapels and leaned back, away from him.

'Hey, Louie,' Lewis clicked his fingers at a bartender. 'This man is dry. Give him one on the house.' He gave Deckard a glance that was reptilian, except a reptile would've given a warmer look.

'The girl?' Deckard insisted.

'You'll see,' Lewis said. 'I didn't say anything but I ain't dumb.' He flicked his eyes toward the next room, where the exotic shows took place. 'Take a look. You'll see. In a minute. You'll see.'

Deckard took the drink profered by the barman served in a cocktail glass. 'And with that, it concludes our business,' Taffy Lewis looked at Deckard. 'The show will be starting in a minute. Enjoy. It's laid on for you.' He walked away. Glass in one hand, talking into the phone in his other hand.

Deckard turned towards the room Taffy Lewis had indicated. As he walked over to it, dodging a couple who were dancing - or fighting, he took another drink from the glass. An announcement came over the PA.

'Ladies and gentlemen. Taffy Lewis and the Exotica presents Miss Salome and the snake. Watch her take the pleasure from the serpent that once corrupted man... ' A synthetic beat started with some ersatz reedy pipe snake-charmer music playing over it. Deckard smiled at the ridiculous introduction and walked casually through to the other room.

'Salome' had just taken the stage with the snake coiled around her body. She wore it like a costume. It was Zhora. Deckard walked through the three-quarters full room into the shadow by the side of the stage. If this is Zhora, perhaps one of the other Replicants is here too. He looked around for Roy Batty or Leon Polokov. And there were always those other Replicants with outstanding warrents, that had come to Earth and were never traced, who had successfully blended with the host population.

Taffy Lewis appeared at his elbow, 'You're not watching the show. Don't you like the work of our artistes, Mr Policeman?'

'Thanks,' Deckard said. 'I need to get into the backstage area.'

'It shall be done.' Again, with an imperceptible gesture from Lewis, a security man appeared. Lewis spoke quietly to him. 'He'll show you in.' He added, by way of a farewell, 'If we must do business again. Remember how I said nuthin'. An' how I helped.'

Deckard nodded and followed the security man.

Deckard stepped into a throng of Showgirls and a few Showmen preparing for the late-afternoon show, looking for her dressing room. It occurred to him that Taffy Lewis or one of his staff might warn Zhora as she came off stage so decided to by the stage. A passing Showgirl grabbed him by the arm and said, 'Hey. No fan's in the backstage area. Not during showtime.' Deckard flashed his I.D. and she let go and looked at him as if he were plague-ridden as she walked away.

The snake-charming music was still droning on but the drumbeats had quickened their pace. He checked around to ensure there was no way out other than past him. The only exit was at the immediate rear of the stage. He would know if she was going to bolt for that. Deckard discreetly removed his gun from the shoulder holster and placed it in his waist-belt holster. Always easier to draw and shoot from the hip.

Zhora was half-way through her act.

Deckard took out his credit card sized wallet and started to shuffle through the deck of false I.D. cards, for something that might be usable. He'd been briefly assigned to Vice a few years back and still had a fake card. Perfect, he thought. He picked that I.D., it read 'Philip Deks; Committee on Moral Abuses'.

Deckard looked up for a moment and saw Zhora - Salome - facing away from the audience, bent over. And where was that snake going? He surmised her show was coming to an end. The music stopped and a roar and applause went up from the audience.

A group of a dozen or so women in, what looked like, very brief 'Little Bo-Beep' costumes walked past him toward the stage. The next act. They obscured his view of Zhora for a few moments. He looked about them, trying to follow Zhora's movements. She was walking straight back to the dressing rooms. A stage-hand had thrown her a wrap as she came off stage but she didn't put it on, just draped it over one shoulder and held it around her waist. Otherwise she was wearing only sequins and glitter. And the snake.

He followed her. As she got to the dressing-room door he appeared at her shoulder.

'Miss Salome,' he said, 'I'm from the American Federation of Variety Artists.' She glanced at him.

'Oh yeah?' she smiled lop-sidedly at him. It was an attractive smile.

'That's right. I'm not here to make you join. Not my department.'

Zhora stepped into her room and flung the wrap off. He followed her in and closed the door after himself. His tone snapped into his no-nonsense police-business manner.

'Actually I'm here from the Confidential Committee on Moral Abuses.' He proffered the card, but she ignored it. She started to unwind the snake into a wickerwork basket.

'The Confidential Committee on Moral Abuses? That's a joke. Right?'

'No ma'am. Y'see there's been reports that the management has been taking liberties with the performers. Have you felt yourself to be exploited in anyway? Anyway at all?' he pressed.

'You want to hear about exploitation? Get along to Grime. THAT is exploitation. This is a rose garden by comparison. Anyone here complaining about the conditions shouldn't be working this business.'

'But was there anything you needed to do to get this job. Anything lewd, or unsavoury, or otherwise repulsive to your person. I saw your show. That snake gets around.' He blinked quickly, a couple of times.

'I turned up. I auditioned. That's how I got this job.'

'You weren't exploited, at all?' Deckard made his voice sound incredulous.

She looked at him and laughed. 'Are you for real?'

'The State is very serious about this sort of thing. Every so often there is a lot of pressure for a crack-down on lewdness and abuse. This is one of those times. It's a gender rights thing.'

'Oh, that again?'

'Yeah.'

'I thought that had all been settled. I like being a woman, and I want to stay this way,' - if only you knew what you really are, thought Deckard - 'No amount of pressure to change is going to cause me to do it!' she added. 'Well. Give the Committee a message, from me. Keep their Committee on Moral Excuses away from where I can see them. And I'll keep my liberties,' she indicated the building where she worked, 'away from where they can see them.'

'But they can see it. They've got dancers out in the street.'

'Hardly lewd though. That's light-entertainment. And you can only see it if you come down this part of the avenue. It's one avenue in how many streets, and avenues, and boulevards in Frisco?' she picked a towel out of a bag on a dressing-table, 'Now, get out of my way.'

'Still. I'd like to check your dressing room. If I may?'

'For what?'

'For holes.'

'Holes?'

'You'd be surprised what a guy would go through to get a glimpse of a beautiful body.'

'Like posing as someone from the State Committee of Moral Excuses?'

'It's serious work, ma'am. They drill holes to watch a lady undress.'

'What would be the point of that? They can watch me undress in front of a room full of people. Six times every day. And at Femme Fatale, and at Menagerie. At Dominator and Grime, before that. They'll have seen me on my back. On my knees. On all fours. Bent over. Crab. Handstands and cartwheels. What more could they see that they haven't already seen?'

'You don't understand Miss. That isn't what they like. They like the thrill of seeing a woman, clandestinely...'

'Go ahead. It's none of my business.'

Deckard noticed the change of tone in her voice. She shrugged and gave a humourless smile as she walked past him to step into the shower. As her back turned to him all expression dissolved from her face leaving a, seemingly, malign non-expression. When Deckard was stood near to Zhora he had kept his gun hand close to his gun, but discreetly done.

As she showered, Deckard looked around the dressing room for - anything. Anything that might be a lead. A connection to Polokov. Polokov was a known shooter. He had nothing on either Roy Batty or Zhora, just yet. But they must have been in on the killing on the shuttle.

Zhora stepped out of the shower and started to dress. She picked up the short Roman skirt and wrapped it around her waist, quickly buckling it. She glanced over at Deckard, who had switched to looking around the walls and the ceiling.

'Find anything?' she asked sarcastically.

'Not so far.'

'That's because there isn't anything to find. And no one here would be bothered.' She stepped into her sandals snapped them closed and began strapping on her grieves.

Deckard looked at her as he made it seem that he was looking closely at the snake.

'Do you own this?'

'It belongs to the club,' she replied.

'Is it a real snake?'

'Of course it isn't real. Who would be here if they could afford a real snake. They'd be off-Earth. That's where I'd be.' Deckard wondered if she might be joking with him. Since off-Earth was where she'd come from. Except she doesn't know I know her. Does she?

'Look. Employment is employment,' she proffered. 'And this pays a lot better than the jobs the poor stiffs who come here have to work at. If you have any real interest in "Abuses", you need to look at some of the crummy jobs people have to do just to make a living, let alone afford to come to a place like this.'

'Must get chilly in winter.'

She looked at him incredulously. And walked past him to pick up the rest of her outfit. 'Look Mister. I'm in a hurry. I've got places to go and people to meet. I was just about out the door between shows when I get the word I'm to put on an extra show. Now I'm late.' She looked and sounded harassed by time commitments. She picked up her breastplate and placed it over her torso. She turned her back on Deckard, immediately the appearance of being rushed for time evaporated from her face. She said, 'Do something useful. Do up the clip at the back for me. Won't you? Quickly. I'm in a rush.'

The sound of applause came through to the dressing room from the stage. He took his hand off the butt of his gun and got hold of one end of the clip. As he did so Zhora drove her elbow hard into his gut. She span quickly and delivered a second blow with the heel of her hand. Deckard was sent flying backwards. The only reason Zhora's third strike - the kill-kick - didn't kill was because the second blow had struck him so hard he had fallen out of the effective range of the kick. He landed on an inflatable couch in the dressing room and her forth blow was misdirected because of the way he bounced off the inflatable, the blow only glancing across his chin. Deckard was deeply winded but his hand, instinctually, went back to the butt of his gun at his waist.

Zhora chopped hard against his wrist, he gave a yowl of pain. She stood over him for a moment. She crouched down and started to twist his tie around, slowly throttling him. He looked up at her and saw the ferocity in her face.

The 'Little Bo-Beeps' were coming back into the dressing-room after their show. She decided to run for it. She bolted for the door pushing past them, pushing them aside. Zhora couldn't see Deckard take the gun out of his waistband holster. Or that he immediately dropped it to the floor as his hand and body went limp as he momentarily blacked out. He came round with the breasts of various of the 'Little Bo-Beeps' swinging in his face as they bent over him. There was a mix of voices around him as he came to.

\- 'Are you all right?'

\- 'It looks like he's been kicked in the head'

\- 'I think it was Rachel'

\- '...that's why she was running outta here'

\- 'He got his head kicked-in? By a girl?!'

The stage manager appeared, standing among them, 'What's he doing in here? What have I told you bitches about...'

'It wasn't us,' the 'Little Bo-Beeps' chorused in protest. 'It was Rachel,' one of them added. Deckard held his fake State Committee of Moral Abuses I.D. at him.

Somewhere, far away, he heard a voice say, 'What is _that_?'

Deckard looked about him, 'Zhora?' he said.

'Who?' one of the Bo-Beeps queried.

'Zhora. She just ran out.'

'Oh. That's Rachael.'

Deckard's head swam. 'Rachael?'

'Yeah,' a few of them answered together. Deckard crinkled his brow. He couldn't think straight. He couldn't think bendy. Or any other way. He couldn't think, period. There was a distant insistence in his brain, for some reason, that told him to get up but his body wanted to pass out. He could feel himself drifting off again.

'Well. We can't leave him lying here,' the stage manager said to the gathered Bo-Beeps. 'C'mon pal,' he said, as he grabbed an arm and hauled Deckard to his feet.

'Drizapone? Anyone got any Drizapone?' Deckard asked.

'Sure,' he heard a voice say. 'Here, have one.' He felt a pill being pressed into his hand. He pushed it into his mouth, threw his head back and gulped it down. 'Here, I'll pay you now.' He grabbed in his pocket and pulled out his Way-2-Pay card, and waved it at the card the woman held out at him. He reeled again.

'Whoa, watch yourself,' the stage manager said. Almost instantly Deckard could feel the restorative of the Drizapone raising him up. He stood away from the stage manager's supporting arm. 'I'm alright - I'll be alright.'

He set off after Zhora.

As he left the dressing-room he heard one of the women say, 'Well. He's really committed to driving out moral abuses, anyway. What'd Rachel do anyway?' And another voice said, 'She's odd. That one. I don't like her. Lets hope he gets her...'

He blundered down the corridor, repeating generally, to anyone. 'Where'd the girl go. The one who ran out?' Looking blearily around him as he did so. One of the Showgirls pointed to the stage door which was swinging open. Deckard ran out. A light rain was falling, the start of the night-rains. It was like a cool thirst quenching drink on a hot day to him now. He ran from the stage door down the back-alley and into the neon and LED lit Olmec Avenue.

He immediately bumped into an old woman and knocked her over and ran on. He stumbled into a crepe vendor and knocked over his stand. He blundered down the street looking about him for any sign of the fleeing figure. A policeman appeared at his shoulder and grabbed him and started to query him. What did he think he was doing, knocking people and vendor stands over. Deckard looked away from scanning the street and looked at the policeman for a moment, 'SFPD. In pursuit. I need your help. Did you see a woman run along here?'

'Some I.D.' the patrolman insisted. Deckard was distracted, he continued looking around the street as he fished in his jacket pocket and pressed his I.D. into the patrol-man's hand.

'The State Committee of Moral Abuses? What's this supposed to be?'

Deckard was still looking around the street.

'Huh?' he said. Deckard fished back in his jacket pocket and flashed his SFPD I.D. instead, simutaneously beaming his details from the badge to the patrolman's screen, as an encrypted confirmation. He took the State Committee I.D. back off the policeman, crumpled it up and chucked it in the gutter. 'A little subterfuge. That's all.' He felt himself getting better by the moment as the Drizapone coursed through his veins. 'We've got to intercept this woman. She is an accessory after the fact. She's my only lead. Did you see a woman running out of that alleyway?' He stabbed a finger at the alley next to Exotica. 'Wearing a Roman skirt, grieves and a breastplate.'

'No, sir. And no one dressed like that came past me. I was over there.' He pointed to a corner mid-way along Olmec.

'That's good,' Deckard said. 'She must've gone this way.' It was the way toward the Livestock Market, the way Deckard had come. 'Bad move, Zhora. There's less junctions that way. But we'll lose her for sure if she makes it to the Market.'

'I'll call it in,' the patrol-man said. Deckard set off again.

The rain had started to fall heavily. It had been hotter than usual all day, so it raised the humidity. The rain on the hot road was condensing as soon as it hit the surface. A fine wispy mist was rising all along the Avenue. There was steam rising from grilles and out of the kerbside food joints, that all set-up after 4:30 in the afternoon. The sizzle of food in woks and on griddles and in frying pans merged with the sizzle of the traffic on the wet road surface. When it was moving. There were taxi's as far as the eye could see. All of this busy scene was set to the rythmn of the rain, now beating hard on the vehicle roofs.

Deckard tried to get a clear run through the street. It wasn't easy. It was late afternoon and the post-work rush had started. Twenty minutes earlier and Zhora would've been easy to spot. But now, the urban tribes were emerging for the night, and would remain from now til way past three in the morning.

There were Dudes, Duds, Hoodlums, GangStars, Slammers, Chaps, Nutters, Persauders, Tarts, Trampps, Riche-Biche, Jills, Workers, Salary-men, Drones, Mohawks, Dead-heads, Hop-heads, Pill-heads, Pulps, Punks, Starry-eyed, Empty-eyed, Screws, Slashers, Binders, Strutters. Peaks, Combs. Plumes. Jaygoes. There was even a group of Krishna, Hari Hari Krishna's in a line, like spilt orange juice seeping on the side walk.

Just the usual crowd. For Olmec Avenue.

Deckard ran into the road and slowed down to a walking pace beside a slow-moving tram. Out of the corner of his eye he saw what he took to be Zhora's head through the tram's windows, walking along on the other side. She was now wearing the plumed helmet that completed the outfit with the large screen-visor over the eyes. Does she have a trace on me on that screen? He stepped up onto the tram's platform and then through to the other side and alighted. In those few moments she had gone. How? She must have a scan on me. He stepped back up onto the tram's platform for an elevated view scanning up and down the street. All of a sudden the policeman reappeared at his side. He told Deckard that they had set up a patrol car at either end of the Avenue. Deckard pointed to him to cover the other side of the Avenue, the one Deckard himself had been moving down. He would now cover this side, the side that he'd seen Zhora on. The tram had started to move off at a pace. Deckard knew he must have passed her. He alighted again.

The Encounter Bar area was petering out and the crowds were getting thinner. Deckard called over to the policeman to walk back the way they had come. They continued up the road past the entrance to the Exotica. That is when Deckard saw the back of her plumed helmet. She could have dipped into any of the Encounter Bars but she hadn't. She really must have somewhere to go. Perhaps the Replicants were keeping separate from each other and had agreed rendezvous points and times. Staying only where the crowds were. Using the crowd as cover. I know I would, if I were them, he thought. Absorbed as he was, he felt a clod sweat sweep over him when he wondered just how many of this teeming crowd were Reps blending in.

Zhora was walking briskly some way ahead. Just as he saw her, she hesitated and turned around. She had spotted the road-block at that end of the avenue. She started walking back down the road, looking about for some place to go. Deckard lowered his head so that it was covered by the bobbing heads of the throng. He was figuring the best way to get a shot at her. He raised his head. She was getting quite close, looking at the premises along that side of the street. Looking for any way out of the trap that had been set. In an instant she turned her head and recognised him. She immediately leapt onto a car parked-up and deftly jumped over onto the roof of a slow moving vehicle. He waved over the road at the uniform and stabbed a finger in the direction of Zhora's fleeing back. He ran out into the road, and with the other policeman they pursued her.

She was heading for the multi-glazed boxed frontage of Menagerie. Each of the glass 'boxes' were made to hold a different dancer, except there were no dancers at this time of day, other than a solitary one in the box nearest the entrance door, that faced directly onto the side walk.

'SFPD,' Deckard called out, 'Stop!'

Zhora looked back as she lept off a car roof, Deckard saw the look of cornered fear in her face for the moment it was turned towards him. He followed, moving sideways to get a better angle of shot.

'Move!' he shouted to the crowds, 'Get out of the way!' They looked about themselves and were startled to see him, gun drawn and aimed, as though aiming at them. They got out of the way.

Zhora dashed into the grid of glazed boxes of Menagerie from the left ward end. The boxes were arranged three deep and five wide. Behind them was the entrance to Menagerie itself. She had to run to the right and that brought her fleeing figure directly into Deckard's sight-line. He fired. He hit her in the right shoulder. Zhora spun round with the impact and crashed into the glass box that the solitary dancer occupied. She slammed into the dancer and slipped, smearing blood off her back onto the dancer. Zhora's momentum carried her crashing into the next glass box behind. She stumbled and slumped to the floor, half in the box, half out. The glass cut her skin on her thighs and arms, the grieves she wore preserved her from more cuts. She stayed still for a few moments but still managed to get up. He moved closer and was standing about fifteen feet away now. Zhora moved on. Now with a limp. To get into the door of Menagerie. Deckard followed her step-for-step as she ran through the grid of glazed boxes and faced the Bar's entrance.

'Stop!' he shouted again. Deckard noticed she had a large curved shard of glass stuck in her left thigh. He got another clear shot. This hit Zhora directly in the spinal column just below the neck, severing all functions from the brain. She stumbled and fell to the left, she crashed headlong into the last glass box on the last row, the one immediately before the entrance to Menagerie.

She lay prone.

The crazy patterns of the smashed remains of the brightly lit glass boxes looked like an out-of-season winter frieze - all jagged ice of the broken glass and snow drifts of the shatter-proof sheets. Deckard wearily walked forward into the debris. The shattered glass lay in heaps, crystal reflecting and refracting the red and orange neon and the bright white LED's of Olmec.

The lone dancer appeared at his shoulder, shouting and crying and screaming at him, seemingly all at once. She started to beat her fists against his arm and slap his face repeatedly. A couple of uniformed police came up and restrained her and led her away for assaulting a police officer.

'Didn't you just see what he did?' she spat the words in Deckard's direction. 'And you're arresting me?!' she wailed.

Another couple of police checked Zhora. They turned her over onto her back, checked her vitals. Deckard noticed that as they turned her it was as though rigor mortis had immediately set in. Her body was almost entirely rigid and there was a waxy appearance to her skin.

A uniform challenged him. He flashed his ID again., 'Deckard. B26-35-4.' He nodded his head down at the remains of Zhora and reeled off the case against. 'Assaulting a police officer. Attempt to kill. Accessory after the fact. Evading arrest.' As though he would win a holiday in the Carribean if he could make the list longer. The uniform examined his ID.

'What's this?' she asked.

'What's what?'

'This. S.A? Never heard of it.'

'Special Assignment.'

'Precinct?'

'Sunset and McKinley.'

'Hold one moment.' She kept her eyes on him as she awaited a message from a despatcher, before she added 'OK,' and handed the ID back to him.

Deckard left the clean-up to the uniformed division. He holstered his gun and started to walk down the Avenue. The crowd around the shooting parted to let him through. Like the showgirl back at Exotica, a lot of them looked at him as though he were diseased. He was used to that look.

He walked down Olmec and stopped at a kerb-side vendor.

'What's your order?' the woman asked.

'Tsing Tao.'

'You know you've got blood on your face?' she said as she turned to pick the bottle off the shelf.

'Yeah,' he said.

'What was that happening down the avenue? Any excitement?'

'No. A fugitive got shot.'

'Again? It's been like the OK Corral down here, lately.'

Deckard nodded silently.

He was rooting around in his wallet for his Way-2-Pay card to pay for the bottle when he felt a sharp tap on his right shoulder. He turned and saw that it was Gaff, using his dragon-headed cane. Deckard grabbed the cane and yanked it out of his hand. He was about to break it over his leg, but stopped.

'Bryant,' Gaff said tersely. Deckard threw the cane down into the street. 'Fetch,' he said.

Gaff looked at where his cane landed in the gutter then looked deep into Deckard's face.

'Cracking?' Gaff asked.

'I'm supposed to be retired from this.'

'Bryant's over there,' Gaff pointed at a police car on the other side of the street, and limped off to pick up his cane.

Bryant sat in the car and waited for the gull-wing to rise and got out of the vehicle. He lifted his collar against the rain and hauled the brim of his hat down low as a squall of wind along the avenue whipped the night-rains directly into his face.

'What was that all about?' Bryant asked him, indicating Gaff picking up his stick.

Deckard shrugged, 'He dropped his cane.'

'Christ, Deckard,' Bryant exclaimed, 'I saw what you did to that skin on the side walk. You blew her spine to hell. What are you using? That's more than just dum-dum's. You using some sort of explosive tips? A personal modification of yours, is that it? Just as well you're SFPD, Deckard, otherwise I'd be cuffing you now. We want these Replicants off the streets but we don't want gun-anarchy, y'understand me.'

Deckard was still half-breathless and weakened from the blows Zhora had hit him with back in the dressing-room. He tried a nonchalant smile but it looked more like a grimace. Bryant looked him over.

'Je-sus H. Christ, Deckard,' Bryant said, 'And you look almost as bad as that skin-job you left back there.'

Gaff appeared again, leaning on his cane. He looked resentfully up at Deckard. Bryant added as an aside to Gaff, 'There's a lot of people in the department who could learn from this guy. He's a god-damned one-man slaughterhouse. One down. Four more to go.' Bryant stooped to get back into the policecar.

Deckard's expression changed, to one of puzzlement. 'Three. Three more to go,' he said.

'Four.'

'Three,' Deckard insisted. Bryant turned back to face Deckard, 'I haven't been able to get in touch with you. I checked with Tyrell, like you wanted me to do. That skin you failed on the VK at Tyrell. Rachel. She's disappeared. Didn't know it's a Replicant. Did you ever hear of such a thing? Something to do with how the brain implant wprks, or so says Tyrell, and he oughta know.'

'I know. I put in my report. Anyhow, you got me in to do four. I've done one, that leave's three.'

'As many as it takes, Deckard. It's absconded. It's now on the list. C'mon Gaff. Let's go.' Bryant climbed back into the vehicle. 'I'd give you a lift but, as you can see its only a two-person cabin. You look terrible Deckard. Get one of the cops up there,' he stabbed his thumb to where Zhora had been shot, 'to give you a taxi ride home. Huh?'

Gaff walked around the vehicle. He looked at Deckard, lifted the dragonheaded cane to the brim of his hat, grimaced rather than smiled, and got in the car.


End file.
